


Worst. Day. EVER.

by HyphenL



Series: We Should Be Lovers [1]
Category: Hannibal (TV), Hannibal Lecter Series - All Media Types
Genre: Drugging, Gen, Humour, Inappropriate touching, Intrusive!Franklyn, M/M, Onesided!Friendship, Onesided!Touching, Protective!Will, UtterlyHelpless!Hannibal, onesided!love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-23
Updated: 2013-09-23
Packaged: 2017-12-27 10:36:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/977747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HyphenL/pseuds/HyphenL
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Franklyn Froideveaux is clingy, but that's not news. What is news, however, is him suddenly taking it to a whole new level while his therapist finds himself incapacitated, which Hannibal appreciates meagrely. Luckily for him, Will Graham steps in and -wait. Why he is also going all touchy-feely? Both of you get your sticky hands off of me!</p><p>Where Hannibal cannot lift a finger to defend himself from two darn annoying patients.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Riz-de-Veau and Bâtard-Montrachet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hannibal cannot lift a finger to defend himself, with unexpected behavioral consequences from Franklyn and Will Graham's part.

 

  


Looking straight at Franklyn in a very focused manner, Hannibal was actually replaying in his head Bach's joyful Canone alla Sesta as interpreted by Glenn Gould, while sipping an imaginary glass of the delectable Château d'Yquem, sat at a sunny restaurant right in front of Florence's beauteous _Duomo_.

From time to time, Froideveaux would ask something ridiculous to get his attention, which Hannibal answered to in a very cold, yet courteous way.

He was usually actually attentive to his patients, but Franklyn had a way of making him feel... ill at ease. He had found his neurotic behaviour quite interesting at first, but was now considering giving the man a referral –which meant a lot, as he had seldom before given up on a patient, manipulating even the dullest ones into a better version of themselves.

But there was something about Franklyn he just couldn't abide, he thought while swiftly removing fingers the other man had gently pressed against his knee, asking for attention.

“I'm sure you've heard Stravinsky's Rite Of Spring rare representation is already sold out” Franklyn was saying, his big, moist eyes gleaming like slugs near a pond. “All good seats have been taken.”

“I am aware” Hannibal sighed, annoyed because he had not been able to get one. They had been put to sale during one of Will's cases, and when Hannibal had gathered enough time to get in front of the computer, it had been too late. Even his acquaintances had not been able to help –this performance, given by an European opera on Tour, would only give the one show in town before flying back home. Hannibal had been following their Tour for months, looking forward to this unique event.

And now Franklyn was looking at him all smug and sluggish like a man about to pop out invites for the reluctant date.

For a split second, he downright hated the man.

“Well, a friend of mine had wanted to bring her family to it but had a change of heart; so she kindly offered me her seats –but as Tobias cannot come either, I now have a whole private box all to myself! I don't have the numbers in head, but I will give them to you so you can pay me a visit during the entr’acte. They will be serving champaign, as I heard it's customary at the Grand Théâtre.”

Hannibal was now feeling a bit sick.

“The _loges_ at the Grand Théâtre can made for three to eight persons” he pointed out. “Surely I would be intruding on the rest of the party.”

“Oh, not at all!” Franklyn exclaimed joyfully, apparently convinced Hannibal wasn't, in fact, politely declining his offer. “I told you my friend had rented the box for many relatives at first, but that none of them could come –there has been an unexpected death in their family. So, I _actually_ will be alone in that box. Unless you, hum, care to join me? Although I am certain your own sit is already quite good.”

_Quite good? Did that living piece of pudding actually thought Hannibal would have settled for anything “quite” good?_

“Shall I remind you again, Franklyn, that our relationship doesn't allow for us to see each other outside the context of therapy?” Hannibal uttered.

“Oh.”

Franlyn's hairy chin trembled a bit at that.

“What if I asked for my next session of therapy to happen on next Tuesday, say, 8 o'clock at my box at the Grand Théâtre?”

Hannibal's heart stilled.

He was going to downright _bloody murder_ the man.

“I insist I must decline” he said with a forced smile, his eyes glowing in pinpoints of red in the moribund sunlight that came through the windows.

He discretely glanced at his watch, and sighed, rubbing his forefront with a hand.

“Alright, where were we?” he said. “You were telling me about Mrs Reels.”

Then he frowned, because Franklyn was looking at him as if he had had the most brilliant of ideas.

Hannibal's back shivered with an impending sense of doom.

“Could I have some more water, please?” Franklyn asked, moistening his lips with the pink tip of his tongue, most evidently planning something that, he thought, he was disguising really well.

Hannibal sighed yet again but got up, happy to be rid of him, even for a minute. His sessions with Froideveaux were getting more and more enduring.

At least that was the last one for the day.

When he came back from the kitchen, carrying an exquisite Baccarat carafe full of bottled water, he noticed Frankly had already refilled his own glass with the contents of a bottle of white wine he had now in display on the table.

“Sorry about that” he said, probably thinking his plan to get Dr Lecter to drink with him was very astute. “I had forgotten I had this with me –do you want some?”

“I never drink while working” Hannibal answered rather painfully, noticing the wine in question was a rather squirming bottle of Bâtard-Montrachet –one of his absolute favourites.

Had Franklyn investigated him?

“Fine, you should keep the bottle then” Franklyn said, sipping at his glass. “I can't carry it back home with me while it's open. Also, I don't like this one that much. It's too... acid for my taste. Is it even a good wine? A friend gave it too me, I don't know.”

Hannibal looked at the clock.

“Your session is almost over, Franklyn. Is there something you wish to add?”

Franklyn looked at him.

“Are you sure you don't want a taste of it? It's a bit acid, sure, but not altogether bad.”

Dr Lecter's nostrils flared. He had quite an unique way of looking at people when he was angered –like a wolf about to snarl. And those red pinpoints of light in the deep maroon of his eyes gave him something savage, feral, that made Franklyn's spine crawl.

It wasn't his favourite facet of Dr Lecter, but one he enjoyed nonetheless.

The man exhaled such control in spite of anger. Franklyn wondered what lied underneath.

He finished his glass of wine with a little knowing smile and got up.

“Thank you for that session, Dr Lecter. See you next Tuesday, I hope.” He hold out his hand but Hannibal blatantly ignored him, going straight for the door instead, which he hold open to help him out.

“See you on Thursday, as always” he said. “Do not forget your exercises.”

Such a professional.

Franklyn took him by the elbow, gently. “It would really please me to see you at the Grand Théâtre on Tuesday” he said. “Just think of it as a courtesy greeting.”

“I'm afraid I won't be at the Grand Théâtre at all” Dr Lecter answered. “Good night, Franklyn.”

He swiftly shut the door and Froideveaux pouted.

 

 *

Once the door was duly shut and locked, Hannibal leaned on it for a moment, and shivered.

For some reason, that bumbling piece of soft walking custard had succeeded in creeping him out.

He really ought to refer him to someone else.

Now, again, which therapist did he hate?

Sighing, he went to sit back in his chair, wondering where that slight flight of fresh air came from, as he was fairly sure to have shut the back door.

But he wasn't in the mood for wonders, and closed his eyes for a moment, walking himself in his Memory Palace, going back to Florence for a time, wandering in the Galleria degli Uffizi, contemplating the marvellous angels of Botticelli.

Shaved and smiling, in appropriate lighting, Will Graham would have looked like them, he thought. That thought brought him back to reality, and the fact that he had, at least, managed to salvage a scrumptious wine from the hands of a savage.

He carefully chose an appropriate glass to pour the delicate liquid in, admiring its airy, yellowish tone in a ray of light, content to mainly relish in his exquisitely playful scent for a while.

When he finally brought the glass to his lips, letting the ticklish citrus and caressing peach notes stroke his palate before washing it in slight remains of hazelnut and earthy flavours, all his troubles had flown away.

Though the wine _did_ sadly have a slightly a unpleasant, bitter aftertaste he couldn't identify.

Quite disappointed, he decided to enjoy it now instead of as an accompaniment for dinner. His mind was now on that gorgeous Renaissance painting he had noticed at an auction website earlier on and planed on buying.

He didn't see time pass him by, especially as he had both a still pretty decent bottle of wine and delightful souvenir of a painting for company. At some point though, as he was reaching the bottom of the bottle and thinking about Botticelli's angels again –he thought about Will Graham, and felt the urge to draw his beautiful face in a mock up of a Renaissance _tableau_.

The wine had to have kinked in strongly than the usual, as he couldn't feel his legs.

Lazily straightening up, he noticed his limbs were going limp –but again, he had just emptied a pretty litre of wine by himself on an empty stomach.

He would draw Will Graham's face on the Uomo di Vitruve, his body displayed anatomically, tastefully draped, his neck slightly bent like one of a Christ on the Cross. He would give him da Vinci's smile and Botticelli's grace.

It was going to be rather beautiful, he thought as he was standing up.

His legs gave in and he fell rather painfully half on his chair, half on the coffee table, his limbs a rather anaesthetic mess.

His eyes immediately darted on the empty bottled of wine on the table.

_What had Franklyn done this time?_

He tried to recall all souvenirs of Froideveaux's last sessions, but his mind was a blur. He made a stop at his Memory Palace, out of curiosity, and noticed how all his carefully shaped memories were now out of place.

Yet, if he could trust his mind, Franklyn had told him about a back pain and a muscle relaxant that he had had to pick up at the pharmacy on his way here.

Oh, if he had it his way, Froideveaux would soon be re-baptised Riz-de-Veau and devoured.

Not by him, he had some standards. Maybe by that charming friend of his who bought expensive Opera tickets by the dozen and didn't sell them back when she stopped having any an use for them.

He tried to straighten himself up but found out he had about as much strength as a newborn infant. What a splendid evening.

Someone knocked.

Hannibal's heart skipped a beat.

Then he heard Franklyn's voice introducing himself back as well as the excuse of a forgotten phone, and decided to play dead.

Said phone was been clumsily slid between the cushions of his patient's chair; Hannibal growled, and closed his eyes.

Franklyn was loud, and rude as ever. He was so getting a referral, _to his fridge_. However, after a surprisingly short amount of banging, Froideveaux backed off.

Hannibal heard with relief his heavy footsteps recede into silence.

He painfully managed to crawl on his couch, and such efforts left him dishevelled and breathless. He also felt rather humiliated, as he had never looked as ridiculous as in the moment a had tried to push his discombobulated body up on the cushions, using gravity rather than strength to get himself to move.

Franklyn was so _fried_.

His own phone rang, and he let out a curse in his mother tongue.

It was Will, leaving a voice message to ask if he could pay him a visit –just what he needed, a witness to this inelegant, incapacitated state.

“Uh, Dr Lecter?” a low, rather timid voice asked near him. “Are you alright?”

A cold breeze softly stroked the face of Hannibal, who suddenly understood that his back door had indeed _been_ open.

Franklyn was not as absolutely stupid as he seemed, aside from the fact that he had just picked on the Chesapeake Ripper.

“No” he started but, luckily, he remember before having the time to say anything else that the tongue was also _a muscle_.

He would _not_ be heard talking with an inebriated tongue.

“I, uh, really needed my phone” the sloppy pudding slug said. “And you did not answer when I knocked at your door, so...”

_You limited lewdly lying leek!_

Hannibal managed to point out at the badly hidden phone –then his trembling, treacherous hand fall back.

He felt awful, his far too relaxed muscles making him melt on the couch like an old Camembert.

“Oh, here it is!” Franklyn exclaimed, earning himself a murderous glance from his good doctor. The plump perpetrator turned around handing his phone as if to prove he had really missed it. Then his face went from fake accomplishment to fake worry and Hannibal wished he was dead.

“You really don't seem alright, Dr Lecter!” Franklyn said. “Is everything alright?”

 _You pronounced the word “alright” twice in the space of too sentence –my life is HELL_.

“Here, let me help you” Franklyn said, apparently hoping to sound caring.

“Am fine” Hannibal managed to mutter but, of course, Froideveaux ignored him and proceeded with his poorly thought through plan.

First he “helped out” Dr Lecter by having him lie down on the couch, which infuriated Hannibal to the point he could only think in Lithuanian for about thirty seconds –and then proceeded to mentally list all the horrible things he wished could be done to Franklyn in French, because French are very good at pointing out the bad aspects of life.

He hated it all the more that he could not lift a single finger to defend himself, and the sole time he managed to actually raise a full arm to push the sickly slug back, said arm gave up half way and proceeded to simply fall and smack him on the nose.

Luckily, his future Boudin Blanc hadn't noticed. He was standing up to go to the kitchen –Hannibal was almost trying to swallow his own tongue at that point– his _kitchen_ , for the devil's sake! from which he brought back a damp towel, which he folded (sloppily) to put on Dr Lecter's forehead.

“See? You're already looking better.”

He was doing his best to look _murderous_.

“I should make you some tea, perhaps?” Franklyn almost sing sang to himself. “With a touch of honey; you'll see, it will make you better.”

And he went back to the _kitchen_.

Hannibal closed his eyes to hide his forming tears.

He couldn't go to his Memory Palace to calm himself, the thing looked like a fudging painting by Dali (not that he disliked Dali, but).

He couldn't go _anywhere_.

He was trapped in his own body, at the mercy of some inept idiot who thought drugging someone was the best way for them to finally understand how good a friend you actually are.

Franklyn also had the distasteful habit to touch him all over –when he had laid him out on the couch, and taken his shoes off for instance. He had then straightened his clothes for him, another excuse to slip his sausage-like fingers where they didn't belong.

When he came back with his sabotaged tea he went further, pretexting an attempt to make him more comfortable by undoing the three top buttons of his shirt _to loosen it up_.

The man was insane.

Hannibal did his best to breathe.

“Here's your tea” Franklyn said, sliding a plump hand under Hannibal's neck to help him drink it.

Hannibal turned his head aside.

“Go. _Home_.” he exhaled with effort.

“What?”

“Go. _HOME_.”

Franklyn put the tea back on the table.

“You never acknowledge me” he said, and Hannibal understood he was doomed.

Hours and hours of heart felt, unpaid confessions ahead. A living nightmare.

“I _am_ a good friend, you know” the plump man pouted. “Or at least, you would know if you gave me a chance.”

He sounded bitter.

Hannibal wished he could properly talk to give him a piece of his mind. He was far beyond politeness at this point.

“Here, have some tea” Franklyn repeated, but Hannibal did his best to ground his teeth together and just waited for it to pass.

“Everyone says my tea is delicious” Franklyn said, lifting Dr Lecter's head up and forcing the cup between his lips. “Drink it.”

His therapist's upper lip drunkenly lifted in disgust.

Even now he seemed to despise him.

Of course he would, he was so much better than him. So well learned, so refined.

Franklyn looked at Hannibal's short, pale eye lashes, that he never had the occasion to watch from so close. His eyebrows, clear or hidden in the cavity where shone dark eyes, black in the absence of light, with two white spots like the head of shiny serpents in a hole. His thin nose and perfectly shaped mouth, unbelievably sensual, made to taste blood-like wine and red kisses. A face sharp like a skull, high cheekbones and strands of hair. Bony hands. Bony everything. This man was a sort of living skeleton, yet well shaped, fit, where he put his hand, on the belly, where he could feel muscles lax but defined under the clothing. Well drawn too on the torso, on the arms.

Hannibal seemed mad. He glared at him.

His clothes were expensive, tailored. He had them made at the same tailor than Tobias and him, Franklyn realised, yet they looked so much better on him. The fabric was soft under his palm.

Hannibal closed his eyes, running to his jelly-like Memory Palace, right into the melting souvenir of Florence, where Italians where speaking Spanish and French people handing him free bottles of water. “ _Dove posso trovare la Piazza San Marco ?_ – _A Venise, mon bon monsieur !_ ”

Yet it was better than now.

“Aren't you hot in that three piece suit?” Franklyn asked.

Venice. A wide place covered in pigeons and people talking. _Mascaras_ everywhere, it was the Carnival. A gorgeous golden dome shining in the background.

“We're going to get you out of that jacket, then maybe talk a bit, alright? I know you are a lonely man, Dr Lecter. You seem to have a lot of friends, but only few of them truly care about you.”

This wasn't Venice anymore, it looked like Parma, small and sweet Parma with its share of wide ruins. Hannibal tried to focus.

But all he could feel was Franklyn's short little fingers sliding on him, hear the friction of fabric and his babbling about lonesome cowboys that do it all by themselves.

“You don't have to go on like this” he said while folding the most inept way his pricy jacket away. “Everybody needs a friend, especially great men like you. Let me be that friend. Just give me a chance. Just ask Tobias. He'll tell you I'm a great friend.”

Hannibal was still determinedly looking away, nostrils flaring, his breath short.

Some times, while he was speaking, Franklyn's eyes stopped at his mouth, mentally drew the curve of his lips with an imaginary finger, wondering about them, their strange, unusual shape, maybe their texture.

He put the flat of his hand on Hannibal's torso and leaned in, so their eyes would meet. “We have a lot in common, Hannibal. Is it alright if I call you Hannibal? You already call me Franklyn anyway.”

He'd made his voice lower, because he had read it was more seductive.

Not that he tried to seduce his therapist! But he wanted his message to come across.

He could feel Hannibal's heart in his palm, from under the fabric, steady and regular. The noise drew him in, and he leaned a bit more over the lying body, his breath short, which stroke Dr Lecter on the cheek.

He felt Hannibal's heart beat a tad faster, and met his eyes. He saw anger in them, maybe fear. Or was it hope? Hope for what?

Was... Was _Hannibal?_...

“You are shyer than I thought” Franklyn said, softly, not to scare Lecter away, gently caressing his torso in an appeasing manner. “Had I known you actually felt that way, I...”

 _Oh. oh. Pudding man was know entering a (even more) delusionally phase_. Hannibal closed his eyes and sighed. He made a tremendous effort to lift himself up, but by now the medication had entirely kicked in and he couldn't move at all. He wondered how much of the drugs had actually been poured in the Bâtard-Montrachet.

If anything, Franklyn had to pay for what he had done to the wine.

“It's alright” Froideveaux said softly while putting his plump hand against Hannibal's cheek, stroking it with a thumb. “I understand.”

 _Good. Go painfully separate into small pieces and store yourself in my fridge then_.

“But I'm here, now. I will not leave you.”

 _That is exactly the problem_.

Hannibal couldn't believe that he, the Chesapeake Ripper, was being held hostage by that needy thing and some magic pills.

His eyelids felt heavy. He had managed to maintain his eyes open until now, but this was proving increasingly difficult.

He tried again to speak, but could only mumble.

“It's alright”, Franklyn said, his voice dripping in kindness, gently stroking his hand. “You can go to sleep. I'm looking after you.”

Now that he thought about it, Hannibal was having trouble breathing. It wasn't an actual issue at the moment, but if the medication hadn't yet displayed its full effect, he might actually be facing the risk of lung impairment (and ultimately, death, if all the idiocy in the room didn't kill him first).

Soon enough, Franklyn might be nursing a corpse. The Chesapeake Ripper's career put to an end by Franklyn Froideveaux! Hannibal shuddered. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Duomo: Cathedral, IT  
> Loge: theatre box, FR  
> Dove posso trovare la Piazza San Marco ?: Where can I find the Piazza San Marco? IT  
> A Venise, mon bon monsieur !: In Venice, my dear sir! FR  
> Mascaras: masks, SPA
> 
> It: Italian  
> Fr: French  
> Spa: Spanish


	2. Tenderized meat à la sauce au sang

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Franklyn Froideveaux overstepped his boundaries when he drugged Hannibal's wine (a Bâtard-Montrachet, you monster!) in order to nurse him better into friendship. Enters Will Graham, who is not amused, and even a little murderously cross. 
> 
> Where Hannibal cannot lift a finger to defend himself and Will does it for the both of them.

He probably dozed off for a while, as the sound of muffled knocking first reached him in a fog.

Franklyn was still holding his hand in a moist palm, disquieted.

“It's fine” he said. “Just go back to sleep, I'll take care of it.”

Loud bangs. Loud bangs Hannibal would have recognised everywhere.

“Will?”

His lungs couldn't gather the strength to scream, let alone speak up. He tried to lift an arm, and felt nauseated.

“Shhhh” said Franklyn. “Don't strain yourself, you need to rest.”

“Dr Lecter?” Will shouted from the other side of the door. “It's Will Graham! I called you earlier; can I come in?”

 _Yes Will, please do come in. I will not mentally complain about your muddy shoes for once_.

“Dr Lecter is with a patient” Franklyn answered (bless his stupidity).

Hannibal could feel Graham's doubt him from the other side of the door.

“At half past eight in the afternoon?” he said, dumbfounded.

“I'm... more than a good friend than a patient” Franklyn said.

“Alright” William answered, ponder straining his voice but his damn good heart willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. “Can I see him for just a moment though? It's important.”

It probably wasn't, but Will didn't like to be told off.

“I'm afraid he really can't see you” Froideveaux answered. “He's feeling a bit down; I'm actually looking after things for him.”

“I thought you were a patient” Will said, clearly startled. “Just let me in for a minute, it won't take long.”

Hannibal tried to call out again, but could only master a murmur.

He felt pathetic.

Thus obviously furious again.

“I have a package” Will lied from the other side of the door. “Can't I just give it to him then go? As I told you, it's important.”

Hannibal felt actually relieved. Thank Graham for empathy.

Although, anyone could have smelt neurosis from Franklyn from miles away.

Froideveaux hesitated.

“Just give me a moment” he said.

He then went straight to that closet in Hannibal's room –the doctor could hear him rummage from the couch– and came back with a cover Hannibal only used on his (actual) hunting trips. He disposed the blanket on him, gently tucking him in, covering his half open shirt (when had he opened the other buttons? Hannibal remembered a blurred litany murmured in Franklyn's voice and the sickly feeling of plump fingertips rubbing small circles into his short chest hair). Froideveaux then displayed Hannibal's arms on the cover, in a way that was supposed to feign peaceful sleep.

He also hid the bottle of wine away in the kitchen, only leaving two cups of tea and a jar of honey.

Finally, he went back to the door and knocked gently on it, to get Will Graham's attention back.

“I can't manage to wake him” he said, “but you may come in anyway. Just don't make to much noise, he's been very tired lately; he deserves the rest.”

 _What he deserved was to rip Franklyn's guts wide open and throw its insides to well-fed pigeons_.

He heard the gentle click of his main door opening, and tried to turn his head to it; but Franklyn had arranged him on his side, in such a way he would have had to turn his whole body to manage a twist of his neck.

“Shhh” (he could imagine Franklyn's short finger put as a silencer over his mouth) “he's really tired, he probably took a sleeping pill of some sort, he does that on a hard day.”

 _HANNIBAL. DIDN'T NEED. MEDICATION. TO GO ON_.

Surely Will would now that. Right, William?

“I understand” Graham said. “I won't be bothering you very long. He naps on his sofa?”

Will went to sit by his side on the couch to have a look at him, and Hannibal managed to lift his eyelids and send him a glance of warning.

“Where's the package?” Franklyn asked, suddenly suspicious.

“That? Oh, it's in my van” Graham answered carelessly, his fingers going for Hannibal's jugular vein, feeling the pulse. “Bulky medical equipment, I need his signature for it.”

He gently proceeded to shake him by the shoulder. “Dr Lecter? Do you hear me? Ah, he's really fast asleep.”

“I told you so” Froideveaux answered, coming to sit on the couch too (Hannibal half closed his eyes to feign forced sleep), putting a hand on Hannibal's shoulder and stroking it gently. “Maybe you should come back on another day?”

“Thanks, but I really can't” should have been Graham's answer. “Could you give me a hand with the package in my van, so I can get you out of my good friend's office and eventually call the cops on you?” should have been the rest of that sentence.

But Graham didn't say anything. He stilled, and for a moment Hannibal's genuinely feared he had ended up being stabbed.

“You said you were Dr Lecter's patient” he suddenly growled – _growled_ , on a low tone, like a menacing wolf _._ _His Will!_

“I'm more of a friend to him” Franklyn replied, trying to sound convincing yet seeming uneasy. “Though I was a patient of his for many years. What about that package?”

“If you're really one of his friends, you would know that Dr Lecter downright _hates_ being touched in such a manner” Will almost spat, visibly empathising very strongly with Hannibal on that point, yet disregarding the fact that his own palm was now resting on his therapist's torso in a protective manner.

What was it with people and hands and touching him lately?

“You have your hands on him” Franklyn unhelpfully pointed out, his own grip getting firmer on Hannibal's biceps. Was that a squeeze?

“Who are you anyway? I thought you were just the delivery guy?”

Hannibal heard a thump, and then Franklyn's whine of pain; he couldn't turn around to see what was happening, but it seemed like Graham had just punched him.

But the sound of it, he wasn't keen on stopping.

Great. Will was finally letting go of his silly sense of human “morals”, and Hannibal couldn't even witness that. He tried to move again, in vain.

His lungs still felt constricted by the medication, heavy to lift for breathing.

The noise then stopped, replaced by Franklyn's whistling's respiration –with a bit of luck he'd had his nose broken.

Then Graham's hands where on Hannibal again, seizing his shoulders to turn him on his back, looking at him with worry and something akin to anger.

“How are you?” he asked. “One blink for yes, two blinks for two. Are you alright?”

 _Yes_.

Though I want to murder Franklyn very much.

“Do you know what he's given you? Has it been long?”

 _Yes_ , and _yes_.

Will looks surprisingly concerned.

He swiftly removes the damp towel on Hannibal's forefront, throws it on the table and dries his head with a hand, as if to remove all trace of Franklyn's doing.

“I'm calling an ambulance” he says, getting his mobile phone out.

Oh, no. Start with my butcher.

“Yes? Yes, it's an emergency! My friend has been drugged. I don't know! Sleeping pills, maybe?”

He looks at Hannibal.

 _No_.

“Alright, maybe not. The police will be helping on that. I'm a special agent. FBI. Will Graham. My number is... and the address...”

Hannibal hears Franklyn getting up and feels anger rush in him again as he can't even straighten up to murder him with a glare.

“He's fine” Froideveaux pouts in a whiny way. “I told you he's just resting. There's no need to call an ambulance! Why did you even beat me for? You'll be hearing from my lawyer, Mr Graam!”

“Just a moment” 'Graam' tells the phone.

He gets up in a second and kicks Franklyn in the groin with the tip of his foot.

Hannibal has no idea where he gets his fury from. Maybe empathising with criminals for a living? He looks positively rabid. “Stay down!” he shouts, looking at Franklyn as if he were a particularly disgusting kind of live rabbit.

“I will be calling the police now. Please hurry.”

He's worried now, and it feels good. Weirdly enough, Hannibal is relieved to sense Will's hands back on him, comforted by it even.

He doesn't like feeling comforted by anyone, but decides to let it go until he's come back to his senses.

“Jack? _Pick up the phone when I call you, dammit!_ No, I will not stop shouting, _YOU LISTEN TO ME YOU PIECE OF SHIT_ –Hannibal's been assaulted. I want you in his office with your men _Right. NOW_. You call me in the middle of the night, I come; now _you_ come here. _I AM CALM._ Move your ass over here pronto, and take some people with you; his attacker is here too.”

“I didn't attack Dr Lecter” Franklyn weakly protests from the floor.

“No, I've roughen him up a bit and he's going to be nice or I'll do it again. I DON'T CARE ABOUT A FUCKING LICENCE SUSPENTION YOU JUST COME HERE AND DO YOUR FUCKING JOB. My greetings to Bella.”

He hangs up.

Hannibal is speechless.

Obviously, it's mainly because he actually wouldn't be able to utter a word without mumbling, but also because he'd never heard Will stand up to Crawford like that.

Graham takes his hands in his, looks at him with piercing eyes as if he were trying to deduce through empathy what exactly has been going on.

He looks at the blanket Hannibal is covered in and snarls, “you would _never_ use such a cover in such a way”, and Lecter feels almost proud of him.

But when he gets the blanket off of him, Graham's face changes, from irritation to downright fury, and he turns back to Franklyn like a bloodthirsty hound.

Hannibal had forgotten about that, his half opened shirt, but can't help to internally smirk when he hears Will go back at Froideveaux, and tries to recall the magnificent Vide Cor Meum to go along with the beating.

When Crawford arrives, he almost decides to cuff Will too, and eventually has to slap him out of his rage. They take Franklyn in, not before having looked through his bag and pockets and given him a cotton pad for his bleeding nose.

By the time the plump mess of a man is taken away, Graham looks ashamed of himself. Jack spends the time needed for Hannibal to be examined and put on a stretcher to scold him, mainly getting back at him for having been yelled at and called a “piece of shit”.

But when Hannibal is finally loaded into the ambulance Will jumps right in, telling Jack off and, probably because he knows how to recognise a truly lost cause, Jack lets him.

Hannibal would have preferred to go alone.

He hates this state he is in, even though it has been confirmed it is only due to muscle relaxants, whose wrapping is now in Graham's hand –he's reading the medication leaflet, sitting near Hannibal's head.

The first thing he had done, though, was to button up Hannibal's shirt, for which he is grateful. He also took his jacket and, visibly, a whole new set of clean clothes, which lies in a bag at his feet.

Hannibal is checking on his Memory Palace, hoping to store memories of Will Graham in a rage somewhere in his Dante's Inferno themed collection. His mind is still too shaky though, and every effort he puts in crumbles instantly.

He feels a hand on his forehead, Will's lifting a strand of hair aside. Then he asked the ambulance woman for the medication wrapping.

Moments after, he is deep in thought, focused on the leaflet like his own life depended on it.

Hannibal breathes. His lungs still feel impaired, he dislikes the feeling.

 _You don't have to come_ , he had wished to say. _I would rather you don't_.

But he would never have let anyone hear him speak gibberish, his tongue heavy against the bottom of his mouth.

He's safe now, Graham should've just gotten home. Or was he still wishing to get a chance to talk to him about whatever he had wanted to?

Hannibal sighed, internally pleading for the day to just finish already.

He couldn't move, he couldn't think, and he was surrounded by witnesses of this embarrassing state. He could never remove them all. He sighed again.

Will's hand was suddenly on his, and squeezing. What was it today with people and touching him in inappropriate–

“You could go into cardiac arrest from this.”

Graham re-read the line of the medication notice.

Hannibal heard Will's erratic breathing fasten.

Then he looked at him.

“It will be alright though” he said –but it wasn't an affirmation, much more like a soft pleading.

That is when Hannibal Lecter knew Will Graham loved him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I see this as a sort of prequel for Delirium (where all the smut is)  
> > http://archiveofourown.org/works/831029/chapters/1579955


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